West=On=Track

History

A Station Once
Again!

The Re-birth of Swinford
Railway Station

Michael Fox

Not long after my return to my "roots" in County Mayo to
live during 2002 I became actively involved with the
"West=on=Track" community-based campaign to reopen in its
entirety the "Western Rail Corridor", from Sligo to Galway,
Limerick and beyond.

My contribution to this extremely well orchestrated
campaign which to date has achieved very positive results
(although there is still further work to be done) has been
two fold. At grassroots (or perhaps "trackbed") level in
Swinford as a member of the local campaign support group, I
have been helping to muster support for the reopening of the
line, and our own station on this line, at the same time
working directly with the prime movers in the campaign
providing editorial for local newspapers, features for
various publications, and material for the campaign website
(www.westontrack.com) as well as engaging in correspondence
with relevant government ministers and departments on behalf
of the campaign.

Whilst I could have been attracted to the campaign for
nostalgic reasons, and as a long time rail enthusiast, my
main motivation has in fact been a desire to see the
restoration of a very important piece of infrastructure
lying neglected in the grass of the west of Ireland, to meet
the different types of travelling and transport needs that
now exist here, and for the undoubted economic, social,
tourism etc benefits that this will bring to this region of
a country acknowledged as having one of the most dynamic
economies in Europe at the present time.

The website includes a series of photographs which I took
in 1981 (armed with a Kodak "Instamatic" camera) of the
whole length of that part of the abandoned line known as
"The Burma Road", this name an overture to the difficult
terrain traversed by the line, from its commencement at
Collooney Junction, near Sligo, to Claremorris, where it
intersected the Dublin/Westport/Ballina main line. This was
some five years after the last "pick up" freight train had
travelled the length of the railway, the passenger service
have gone by the board some thirteen years previously.

At that time, along many stretches of the railway, the
tracks were disappearing into the undergrowth and
encroaching trees and bushes, stations and railway
gatekeeper's cottages lay silent, derelict and abandoned,
except for the odd building taken into private ownership.
The associated paraphernalia of the railway, or rather what
was left of it, lay disconnected, bent, broken and rusting,
with signal posts and gantries once standing proud now
devoid of their semaphore signal arms, long gone along with
many of the splendid cast iron warning signs of one type or
another which had adorned the railway structures, "permanent
way", gates at farmers accommodation crossings etc, and no
doubt now taking pride of place in many a railway
enthusiasts "railwayana" collection.

A milestone (or milepost?) in the "West=on=Track"
campaign was achieved last year when the government here (in
a timely manner, surprise, surprise, ahead of a general
election expected in the next eighteen months or so) rolled
out its "Transport 21" master plan for transport
improvements in this country. It included in its provisions
(albeit largely focussed upon the perceived transportation
needs of the eastern part of this country) timescales,
inexplicably lengthy in the opinion of many, for the phased
refurbishing and reopening of the railway to passenger and
freight services from Ennis in County Clare, the present
terminus of the Irish Rail passenger service from Dublin via
Limerick, and lying on the route of the Western Rail
Corridor, northwards to Athenry and Galway. From there the
railway is to re-open, again in phases, to Tuam and on to
Claremorris in County Mayo. Communities along these
stretches of line now look forward to the return of their
trains in the foreseeable future.

Whilst these announcements were to be applauded, and were
well received in principle, the prime objective of and
momentum for the campaign has been, and firmly remains, the
reopening of the whole Western Rail Corridor in its entirety
as a complete "joined up" railway all the way to Sligo.

Sadly, the reopening of the northern "Burma Road" stretch
has not been given a very high profile in "Transport 21" and
whilst there is acknowledgment that the line should be
completed through to Sligo the proposed timescale for this
suggests that the reopening has been put on "the long
finger" (some might say on a digit of similar length to this
stretch of the railway!). However, campaigners will be very
vigilant to ensure that once Claremorris is reached, there
will be no undue delay on the part of the powers that be in
completing the reopening of the line all the way to Sligo.
There is some optimism that this will be completed sooner
rather than later, given its strategic position in relation
to Knock Airport and certain "decentralised" Government
departments due to be relocated to this part of County Mayo
(unions and other factors permitting!).

It is certainly not all "doom and gloom" for this last
section of the "Corridor", however, in that a promise by the
Department of Rural Affairs here, headed up by Minister
Eamon O'Cuiv (and due to "decentralise" here), to take
action to protect the route of the "Burma Road" for future
reopening is in the throes of being fulfilled. For the past
number of weeks and working south from Collooney, CIE, the
state transport authority, has been clearing the line of
undergrowth, bushes, trees and shrubbery, rails are
reappearing, and station areas have been or are being
cleaned up. By the end of March this work should be
completed through to Claremorris. Fences and gates along the
line are being mended and reinstated, and already the line
is taking on the appearance of a real railway again.

As a result of the this clearance work my own local
Swinford Station has arisen like a veritable phoenix from 40
years of dense encroaching undergrowth and invading
shrubbery and, with an air of hushed expectancy, now awaits
the return of its trains.

In fact, standing, in the descending dusk of a west of
Ireland spring evening, on the newly exposed rails lying
between the well constructed stone platforms of Swinford
Station, with still extant station house, stone water tower
and brick built signal cabin, and peering firstly northwards
into the distance towards Sligo and then, turning around,
southwards towards Claremorris, it would not be hard to
imagine, nay it would not be surprising to see, in my moment
of nostalgia, a train reappearing and heading towards the
station, as if the intervening closure period of 40 years
had only been the mere blink of an eye or, perhaps, just a
bad dream from which I had just awoken to discover that our
station and its trains had not gone away after all. A
station once again (apologies to the Wolfe Tones for the
play on words!).